Allotment-scale ridge & furrow?

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Allotment-scale ridge & furrow?

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NorthernMonkeyGirl

Joined: 10 Apr 2011
Posts: 4630
Location: Peeping over your shoulder

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 14 8:33 pm Post subject: Allotment-scale ridge & furrow?

Thoughts?

I don't have resources for raised beds, so after considering digging some drainage ditches (that don't really have anywhere to drain to?) I am now wondering about a crude form of ridge/furrow, where the furrows are also the paths, and yes will get flooded, compacted, and trashed. The ridges would be the beds, probably 3-4 feet wide, running the whole length of the allotment. They would be further raised by mulching (I'm doing a basically-no-dig thing, lots of organic matter piled up on top)

Anyone done anything like this?

Behemoth

Joined: 01 Dec 2004
Posts: 19023
Location: Leeds

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 14 9:16 pm Post subject:
Thats sort of what if do but across the plot.

NorthernMonkeyGirl

Joined: 10 Apr 2011
Posts: 4630
Location: Peeping over your shoulder

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 14 9:20 pm Post subject:
Any reason for going across rather than longways? It just seems to slope slightly that way so presumably would drain better?

oldish chris

Joined: 14 Jun 2006
Posts: 4148
Location: Comfortably Wet Southport

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 14 9:36 pm Post subject:
I was always too tight to pay for the shuttering needed to created raised beds on my allotment. So, I pretended, only walking on the 15" wide carpeted bits between my beds. For a heretical view: https://simonsallotment.blogspot.co.uk/2009/03/how-i-garden.html

NorthernMonkeyGirl

Joined: 10 Apr 2011
Posts: 4630
Location: Peeping over your shoulder

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 14 10:01 pm Post subject:
Yeah, I'm not forking out time and effort to provide slug habitat The no-dig and mulching is certainly massively increasing the earthworm population though, and anything raised will need to be well-mulched over summer to stop it setting like concrete. Did I mention it was clay?

Behemoth

Joined: 01 Dec 2004
Posts: 19023
Location: Leeds

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 14 10:46 pm Post subject:

NorthernMonkeyGirl wrote:

Any reason for going across rather than longways? It just seems to slope slightly that way so presumably would drain better?

less of a hike to the middle of the bed. not so far to walk around.

Treacodactyl
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 25795
Location: Jumping on the bandwagon of opportunism

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 14 10:49 pm Post subject:
IIRC Bob Flowerdew makes raised beds by shoveling soil into a pile and mulching paths with straw. Then when the straw rots shovels that on top of the bed and so on.

NorthernMonkeyGirl

Joined: 10 Apr 2011
Posts: 4630
Location: Peeping over your shoulder

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 14 10:53 pm Post subject:

Behemoth wrote:

NorthernMonkeyGirl wrote:

Any reason for going across rather than longways? It just seems to slope slightly that way so presumably would drain better?

less of a hike to the middle of the bed. not so far to walk around.

sensible.

Maybe I could channel my artistic side and do diagonal stripes?

Mr Flowerdew's methods sound like my kind of style.

sean
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 42219
Location: North Devon

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 14 10:53 pm Post subject:
Some sort of plaid?

NorthernMonkeyGirl

Joined: 10 Apr 2011
Posts: 4630
Location: Peeping over your shoulder

Posted: Thu Dec 04, 14 11:00 pm Post subject:
If you look at where I've dug out docks and thistle, it's more of a Pollock at the moment.

dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 46212
Location: yes

Posted: Fri Dec 05, 14 12:35 am Post subject:
ahhh splendid cheap rotting straw is well useful i have had good results by digging drain/heap bits of land plant marrows,pumpkin etc in the ditch bits and beans ,toms etc etc in the dry bits the three sisters method can be adapted to stuff that is good in the uk

Ty Gwyn

Joined: 22 Sep 2010
Posts: 4613
Location: Lampeter

Posted: Fri Dec 05, 14 2:02 am Post subject:
If the ground does slope slightly longway`s,then drainage would serve purpose, Of ease of access crossways would benefit, Compromise with a Herringbone,drainage and ease of access.

kGarden

Joined: 01 Dec 2014
Posts: 178
Location: Suffolk, UK

Posted: Fri Dec 05, 14 8:22 am Post subject:

I started with what I know as "lazed raised beds" - no formal retaining sides.

I dug out the paths, a spit's depth, and piled that soil onto the beds and that was that. Manure then added on top annually, some digging took place but not routinely.

Heavy clay here, only any use for modelling!, the plot was land that had been rough grass for 50 years at least. The beds drained well from the get-go and have improved as the soil structure has improved. We never walk on the beds which are 4' wide (touted as maximum easy reach when worked from either side). The plot is flat so the paths don't drain downhill, as such, but seemed to work to drain the beds by virtue of being a few inches lower.

I let grass grow on the, lowered, paths which I mow once in a while as I find that works better for me than having any path coating that will pick up on muddy boots in winter (when I leave the grass fairly long to act as an absorbing layer).

Only downsides are that the shoulders of the bed collapse into the paths, a bit, over a couple of years and need striping and piling back onto the beds; it is hard-ish to plant ON the shoulders so some space wasted; and no break-line between bed and path, so the grass from path tends to creep back into the edges of the beds.

I came-across some timber a year or two back, so I've tarted mine up now, but they were fine for the half dozen years before that.

Lazy raised beds

Tarting up

NorthernMonkeyGirl

Joined: 10 Apr 2011
Posts: 4630
Location: Peeping over your shoulder

Posted: Fri Dec 05, 14 8:51 am Post subject:
Looks good! I have just remembered that running along the far side of a long edge there is a (relatively v. small) field drainage ditch, I'll have to see if that goes anywhere but if so it seems an obvious place to drain in to.

NorthernMonkeyGirl

Joined: 10 Apr 2011
Posts: 4630
Location: Peeping over your shoulder

Posted: Fri Dec 05, 14 7:05 pm Post subject:
What do we think about a dip in the top of each ridge to take kitchen waste? It is bokashi-ed, so already starting to break down, and I create a lot of veg peelings etc that refuse to stay neatly in the actual compost heap

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